BY NICOLINA LEONE #HappinessHabits613 Can you name three things that you are grateful for? What about an experience in the last 24 hours that made you happy? It takes 21 days to build a habit, I’m sure many of us have tried this before: eat healthier, workout more often, read everyday – all valiant and […]

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BY NICOLINA LEONE

#HappinessHabits613Can you name three things that you are grateful for? What about an experience in the last 24 hours that made you happy?

It takes 21 days to build a habit, I’m sure many of us have tried this before: eat healthier, workout more often, read everyday – all valiant and notable habit-building choices. But what about building your happiness? The questions above are the beginning to making your life a little brighter.

Manal Nemr, life coach, nutritionist Amy Longard, and yogi Kate Durie have started HappinessHabits613. This is an initiative to create a happier Ottawa and they will be kickstarting their program with a free event at The HUB on August 1st from 2-4 p.m.

If you can’t make it out to the event, join the Facebook group and participate in the 21-day challenge with your fellow Ottawans. You can expect to receive the down low on free events and check-ins throughout the 21-day adventure. Just some of the fun things you’ll get to participate in include Brown Bag Lunch n Learns at the HUB and Yoga & Meditation class at Pure Yoga Ottawa.

Alex and Marta at Railbender studio in 2014. Photo by the loveOttawa project

Railbender has become a favourite, not only in it’s own neighbourhood of Hintonburg, but around Ottawa. This isn’t only due to the great location, beautiful space, and talented artists, it’s also because of the people behind the art, the genuinely fun, kind and caring folk who work there. And now, co-owner Alex Néron needs our help. He has recently been diagnosed with colon cancer and is currently undergoing treatment. An initiative has been started to raise money for medical and living expenses not covered by OHIP.

Join the Railbender crew and all his supporters Saturday, August 1 at 10 p.m. at the Hintonburg Public House for a party – dancing to be encouraged by DJ Sweet Cheeks.

With support from Beyond The Pale (who donated a keg, 100% of the sales of this will go to the cause), a live auction and raffle with items from Victoire, PLAY Food & Wine, HPH, Beau’s, Zazaza, Wilf & Adas, and much more (check out the Facebook Page here)!

If you’d like to donate to the raffle or auction, get in touch with HPH. And if you can’t make it to the party, loveOttawa has created loveRailbender where you can e-transfer funds directly to Alex at loveRailbender@love-ottawa.com.Hintonburg Public House, 1020 wellington St. W., 613-421-5087, hintonburgpublichouse.ca

]]>http://www.ottawamagazine.com/culture/weekender/2015/07/31/weekender-update-two-more-things-to-do-this-august-long/feed/0ARTFUL BLOGGER: Novels, nudes, and new art ideas at the National Gallery of Canadahttp://www.ottawamagazine.com/culture/artful-blogger/2015/07/30/artful-blogger-a-book-for-kids-art-for-adults-and-penny-pinching-at-the-national-gallery/
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BY PAUL GESSELL Summer is the perfect time to get your kids interested in reading for fun. Tell them to ditch all electronic devices, go outside, sit under a tree or laze on a cottage dock and start reading. Let them try Endangered: Mystery on the Daily News Beat, the new Young Adult novel from […]

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BY PAUL GESSELL

Summer is the perfect time to get your kids interested in reading for fun. Tell them to ditch all electronic devices, go outside, sit under a tree or laze on a cottage dock and start reading. Let them try Endangered: Mystery on the Daily News Beat, the new Young Adult novel from prolific Ottawa author Kate Jaimet.

Endangered is a fast-paced story about 17-year-old Hayley Makk. She is working for her father’s newspaper in Halifax. She is absolutely fearless — perhaps too fearless — and is determined to land a frontpage scoop. She is also sweet on a handsome young Mountie and learns not to drink and date. (Betcha Nancy Drew never got drunk).

Before Hayley can complete her investigation of a mysterious blood-splattered shack, her father pulls her off the story. Hayley is missing a credit in order to graduate high school. A teacher, Ms. Cameron, has cooked up a deal with Hayley’s father: Hayley will get a credit for biology if she helps the teacher locate and study a rare sea turtle supposedly living off the Nova Scotia coast.

Reluctantly, Hayley agrees to join the turtle search. Much to her chagrin, she has to work alongside Ernest, another teenager but one who is a nerdy tree-hugger and wouldn’t think of hurting a turtle, or any other animal, in the tiniest of ways. His radical pro-animal sensibilities scuttle the initial attempt to attach a tracking device to the rare turtle.

Author of Endangered: Mystery on the Daily News Beat, Kate Jaimet

Ernest is the kind of geeky boy teenage girls love to hate. Daredevil Hayley is the role model here. I suspect this means girls will love Endangered more than boys do. But, hey, you can’t please everybody.

Hayley soon learns there is a connection between the rare sea turtle and the blood-splattered shack. Good guys turn into bad guys. Shots are fired. The Mounties arrive. They get their man and Hayley, most chastely, gets hers, not to mention a great frontpage scoop.

Jaimet is the author of such Y.A. books at Dunces Rock, Dunces Anonymous, Break Point, Edge of Flight, and Slam Dunk. She is a former newspaper reporter herself, having worked at The Ottawa Citizen and the New Brunswick Telegraph-Journal.

I would love to read more stories involving Hayley Makk, a more mature version of Flavia de Luce, the girl detective (and chemist) who is the phenomenally popular heroine of Alan Bradley’s books set in a small English town. Hayley has hormones; Flavia is too young for lust.

But will today’s juvenile readers identify with a teenaged newspaper reporter like Hayley? Is a newspaper setting as dated for today’s youth as horses and buggies? Maybe Hayley’s dad should have been a webmaster.

Endangered is to be released Aug. 4 from publisher Poisoned Pen Press.

Male Nude Polaroid 1

Male Nude Polaroid 6

Is the male gaze upon the female body different than the female gaze upon the male body?

This question so intrigued two established Toronto painters, Brent McIntosh and Shelley Adler, a few years ago that they embarked upon The Nude Polaroid Project. Each of the artists would take photographs of a nude model of the opposite sex. Then the works would be exhibited side by side.

Examples of the experiment were to be displayed at Galerie St-Laurent + Hill from July 30 to Aug. 22. The original Polarioid prints have been scanned and mounted on aluminum-like Dibond.

Based on some of the online images seen of the artists’ works in advance of the exhibition, I reached this conclusion: The images of the female nudes were far more imaginative than those of the male nudes. Now is that really a difference in the way men and women view each other or simply a difference in two artists, regardless of their gender? Go judge for yourself.For info: galeriestlaurentplushill.com

Marc Mayer, director of the National Gallery of Canada, was asked a few years ago how he planned to offer quality exhibitions despite shrinking revenues from both government and box office. Among his plans was to rely more on exhibitions from the gallery’s own art collection. And that is certainly what he has done this year.

Organizing a showcase for the likes of Picasso, Rembrandt or Renoir are very expensive. Insurance and transportation costs alone can make such shows too costly for penny-pinching art museums. Assembling exhibitions from the National Gallery’s own vaults is far cheaper. And so, this year, we are getting some detailed looks at gallery treasures that otherwise might have had less public exposure.

First up was M.C. Escher: The Mathemagician, which opened last December and continued until May. Maurits Cornelis Escher was an early 20th century artist best known for his prints of interlocking repetitive shapes and impossible architectures. Every long-haired hippie of the 1960s had an Escher print on the wall. The posters were most entertaining when the viewer was stoned on acid. But they remain fascinating for today’s audiences, even when no drugs are used.

Durham Cathedral from the Wear, Frederick H. Evans

This summer the gallery is offering two other exhibitions harvested from its collection. One is an exhibition of photographs by Victorian-era British photographer Frederick H. Evans, perhaps best known for his moody shots of architecture.

The Trampled Flowers, Marc Changall

The other summer-long show is a collection of prints by Marc Chagall telling the ancient Greek tale of the lovers Daphnis and Chloe. Both exhibitions close Sept. 13.

Then, come Oct. 9, there is the exhibition Beauty’s Awakening: Drawings by the Pre-Raphelites and their Contemporaries from the Lanigan Collection. This is an exhibition of 100 Victorian-era prints collected by Saskatoon dentist Dennis Lanigan. Twenty of the prints have already been gifted to the National Gallery. The other 80 are promised gifts. This is one of the best private collections of its type in Canada. The exhibition closes Jan. 3, 2016.

Interestingly, three of the aforementioned exhibitions (Escher, Chagall and Lanigan) were curated by the same person, Sonia Del Re, associate curator of European, American and Asian prints and drawings. Surely, Del Re was the hardest working curator at the National Gallery this year. It makes you wonder what all the other curators were doing.

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BY NICOLINA LEONE AND AMY ALLEN The Ottawa International Busker Festival Street performances are no new source of entertainment. Busking, coming from the Spanish word “buscar”, dates back throughout ancient history and has been done all over the world by almost every culture. From England to France to Japan and North America, many of the […]

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BY NICOLINA LEONE AND AMY ALLEN

Busker’s performing at Ottawa’s 2014 festival

The Ottawa International Busker FestivalStreet performances are no new source of entertainment. Busking, coming from the Spanish word “buscar”, dates back throughout ancient history and has been done all over the world by almost every culture. From England to France to Japan and North America, many of the same talents were performed hundreds of years ago as they are today.

Fast forward to 2015 and you can check out some of the international acts right here on Sparks Street with stages set up between Elgin and Lyon. Performers are coming from coast-to-coast; check out Silver Elvis from Toronto or the Circus Firemen from Australia. Crowds of over 225,000 will visit one of Canada’s oldest and biggest busker festivals.

Show times are between 11 a.m. and 11 p.m. starting Thursday, July 30 and running through the long weekend. Check out the website for the schedule and don’t forget to vote for your favourite performer.

It’s free for all (but remember to bring your gratuities); save for an adult-only portion taking place Sunday, August 2 at the Marriott Hotel, 100 Kent St where our international buskers will be collaborating with some of Ottawa’s top burlesque acts! Tickets are $20 with only a limited quantity available. And don’t miss the grand finale on Monday, August 3, 6 p.m.Sparks St., ottawabuskerfestival.com

Capital RibfestSmell that? It’s the tantalizing aroma of ribs — lots of ribs! — slathered with barbecue sauce and smoking on an outdoor grill. Brought to you by Capital Ribfest, this meaty smorgasbord features a half dozen ribbers and grillers from Canada and the United States who, over the course of the long weekend, are cooking up a feast of beef ribs, pork ribs, chicken, and pulled pork sandwiches. You can also treat yourself to corn on the cob, salads, pizza, fries, doughnuts, ice cream, and a handful of gluten-free and vegetarian treats.

Up on stage, entertainment includes old-time jazz band the Boxcar Boys, local indie rockers Amos the Transparent, country rock duo Sons Command, and much more.

The festival is on at City Hall’s Festival Plaza from Thursday, July 30 until Monday, Aug. 3. Admission is free, but you pay for what you eat. The event is cash-only, with an ATM on site. See website for more info.Festival Plaza, City Hall, 110 Laurier Ave. W., capitalribfest.ca.

Union Duke set to perform at the Black Sheep Inn Friday, July 31

Union DukeUnion Duke’s second studio album, Cash & Carry, is full of songs that wouldn’t be out of place at a campfire sing-along — which isn’t too surprising, given that it was recorded at a cabin in the Ontario wilderness.

The bluegrass/folk/country quintet has been playing together since they were 13 years old. Between their rollicking foot-stompers and only slightly slower paced reflections on love, it’s clear they’ve used that time well to perfect their rich vocal harmonies and master their finger picking skills. They perform at the Black Sheep Inn on Friday, July 31. Tickets start at $10.The Black Sheep Inn, 753 Riverside Dr., Wakefield, 819-459-3228, theblacksheepinn.com.

I’m not Jewish but my mother isIf the title of this play has any insight to the type of humour we can expect, I’m thinking irony. Gladstone owner, Steve Martin (for the foreseeable future anyway, as he has just listed the historic building for sale) wrote and features in this comedy with Rebekah Shirey and Barbara Seabright-Moore. Premiering Wednesday, July 28 and running through to August 8, Martin, playing Christopher, has a hot date and a (Jewish) mother who is getting in the way. Tickets are $30 and as it is general admission, be sure to arrive well before the curtain rise to have time to grab yourself a drink and a good seat.The Gladstone, 910 Gladstone Ave., 613-233-4523, thegladstone.ca

Full Moon Yoga – FreeDo you like to do yoga? Or are you one of those people that says you like to do yoga but never actually gets around to it (me)? Well, clear your schedule this Friday, July 31, 9 p.m. because it is free! With the full moon, and a blue moon at that, Rama Lotus will be hosting an event for all levels at Lansdowne outdoors, weather permitting, and indoors if necessary.TD Place, 1015 Bank St., 613-234-7974, ottawayoga.com (phone number and website for Rama Lotus)

Street Eats“Creating Food Events With You In Mind.”

I sincerely felt that TW Events had me in mind when they created Street Eats. On Saturday, August 1 from 12 p.m. to 8 p.m., head to the Canadian Aviation and Space Museum to indulge in such big name foodie brands as Ad Mare, Brew Bar, Mill Street, Beaus, and more. Street Eats is also giving back to the community by giving a scholarship fund to one lucky Algonquin student.

Tickets are $20 for entry, and food and beer tickets are on special if you purchase online in advance: $15 for 20 tickets or $20 for 20 at the door.

Your ticket will also get you admission to the Canadian Aviation and Space Museum, an opportunity to win giveaways, enjoy live music by The Lionyls, participate in beer and food challenges, and be a part of the Street Eats video.Canadian Aviation and Space Museum, 11 Aviation Pky., twevents.ca/streeteats/

Ottawa’s Hidden GemsA placid lake in the midst of urban chaos, a boardwalk winding through greenery on the banks of the Rideau River, a solitary pine surrounded by stunning autumn marshes — these are the aspects of Ottawa that are rarely seen, but deserve a little love.

In Cube Gallery’s Hidden Gems, a group of six painters capture the beauty of Ottawa’s nooks and crannies, from Lemieux Island in the Ottawa River to Patterson Creek in the historic Glebe. The vernissage is on Sunday, Aug. 2. The exhibition continues until Sunday, Aug. 30. Admission is free. Visit the website for more info.Cube Gallery, 1285 Wellington St. W., 613-728-2111, cubegallery.ca.

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By AMY ALLEN AND MATT HARRISON Ways of Something “When the camera reproduces a painting, it destroys the uniqueness of its image. As a result its meaning changes. Or, more exactly, its meaning multiplies, fragments into many meanings.” — John Berger, 1972, Ways of Seeing More than four decades later, Berger’s observations — taken from […]

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By AMY ALLEN AND MATT HARRISON

Image by Georges Jacotey

Ways of Something“When the camera reproduces a painting, it destroys the uniqueness of its image. As a result its meaning changes. Or, more exactly, its meaning multiplies, fragments into many meanings.” — John Berger, 1972, Ways of Seeing

More than four decades later, Berger’s observations — taken from his iconic four-part BBC mini-series, Ways of Seeing — is being reexamined by Canadian and other international artists: 110 of them, to be exact. Culled together by Toronto-based artist Lorna Mills, her mammoth art project, Ways of Something, will present video, 3D renderings, animated gifs, live web cams, and digitally manipulated visuals in the context of the 21st century (hence the Lana Del Rey collage), along with Berger’s original narrative and voiceover, in an effort to ask the question: is Berger’s ground-breaking 20th century presentation still relevant in the 21st century? Find out this Thursday, July 23 at SAW Video from 6pm to 11pm. Admission is free. For more information, visit website.SAW Video is at 67 Nicholas St.

The Creation of the World and Other BusinessWe all know the story: God created Adam and Eve, who ate the forbidden fruit offered by Lucifer, only to be ejected from the Garden of Eden as punishment for their transgression. But how did things get to this point?

Renowned playwright Arthur Miller delves into this question in his 1972 tragi-comedic play The Creation of the World and Other Business, beginning with the necessity of getting Adam and Eve to procreate when they are just too innocent to figure it out for themselves. From there, the play follows their fall, their trek through the desert, and the deadly conflict between their sons, Cain and Abel. It’s a lighthearted show that still manages to treat its subject matter with the gravity it deserves.
The show starts on Thursday, July 23 at the Great Canadian Theatre Company and continues until August 8. See website for ticket info.The GCTC is at 1233 Wellington St. W.

Samantha Crain

Samantha CrainSamantha Crain, a promising young singer-songwriter hailing from Oklahoma, was inspired to write her new album, Under Branch & Thorn & Tree, when she met a woman in Elk City, Okla., who had come to town in the ‘70s to be with her boyfriend during the oil boom. Decades later, well after the collapse of that relationship, she’d yet to leave for greener pastures — life circumstances and poor finances kept her rooted there. The plight of the working class woman is a central topic on the album, and Crain weaves tales of heartbreak, hard times, triumph, and joy with an emotional honesty that belies her youth.

Crain performs at Raw Sugar Café in support of the album on Friday, July 24. Tickets are $10 at the door. See website for more info.

Raw Sugar Café is at 692 Somerset St. W.

Capital Ukrainian FestivalBudmo! — that means “shall we live forever” and it usually involves clinking glasses filled with, perhaps, Zirkova Vodka or a cold, crisp Lvivske 1715 pilsner, which dates back to 300-year-old monastic brewery in Lviv, Ukraine. Either way, it’s part of the Ukrainian experience happening at the Capital Ukrainian Festival this weekend. Perogies, smoked garlic sausages, bright red borscht, cabbage rolls, smoked meat, pampushky (doughnuts), and hand-crafted ice cream will be served along with music and dancing, egg decoration workshops, art, film, and other activities. It’s happening over three days — from Friday, July 24 to Sunday, July 26 — mostly at St. John The Baptist Ukrainian Shrine near Heron Road and Prince of Wales Drive. While admission to the festival is free, some of the activities/workshops have a participation fee. See website for more information.

St. John The Baptist Ukrainian Shrine is at 952 Green Valley Cres.

The Things We Do for LoveIs it possible for an elderly bachelor and a hot-blooded young woman to find true love? And for that matter, is it possible to a win a man’s heart through subterfuge, deceit, and trickery?

Love is complicated, and Odyssey Theatre explores its various manifestations in The Things We Do for Love, a trio of plays by beloved Spanish writers. The first, Saving Melisendra, is based on a chapter from Miguel de Cervantes’s Don Quixote, in which Quixote is so engrossed by puppet theatre that he leaps into the performance to rescue the fictional damsel in distress.

In the next, Federico García Lorca’s The Love of Don Perlimplín and Belisa in the Garden, the elderly Perlimplín woos his young wife in extreme ways, while in the third, Whether You Like It or Not, a scheming noblewoman causes chaos in Naples in her pursuit of a count’s affections.

Performances begin at Strathcona Park, located along the east bank of the Rideau River, on Saturday, July 25. The show continues until August 23. See website for ticket info.

Strathcona Park is at Laurier Avenue East and Range Road

Centretown MoviesJune 1933, New Jersey — it’s a hot Saturday night. Rolling up in your Ford, you throw the car into park, lean back, maybe get a little fresh with your sweetheart (or maybe not), and marvel at this strange new attraction. The air is electric — not just from the heat, but from the buzz of excitement and anticipation for the never-before-seen. Adding to electricity is a cacophony of engines, radios, and children — a great din that grows in intensity until … silence, as a flash of light beams out over metal rooftops onto a white sheet stretched out on Admiral Wilson Boulevard.

Eyes are transfixed by the first images of Adolphe Menjou’s film, Wife Beware, flickering out across the night.

Unless you were standing next to Richard M. Hollingshead, the creator of the drive-in movie theatre, you probably have no idea how intensely he experienced those first few moments. But anyone who has ever watched their first movie under the night sky came close. Recreating that moment, more than 80 years later, is Centretown Movies, which has been showing films throughout the summer since 2001.

Already in full-swing, this Saturday, July 25 they’ll be showing Jurassic Park — a great choice for an outdoor summer flick. Films begin at 9pm and screen in Dundonald Park. Admission is free. See website for more info and future showings.

BY HATTIE KLOTZ This article originally appeared in the Summer 2015 print edition of Ottawa Magazine To Play For a day of adventure close to town, head to Arbraska Laflèche Park, just north of Cantley in Val-des-Monts. Play in an aerial park that includes wobbly suspension bridges, lianas (vines), monkey bridges (rope bridges), swings, and […]

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BY HATTIE KLOTZ

This article originally appeared in the Summer 2015 print edition ofOttawa Magazine

To Play
For a day of adventure close to town, head to Arbraska Laflèche Park, just north of Cantley in Val-des-Monts. Play in an aerial park that includes wobbly suspension bridges, lianas (vines), monkey bridges (rope bridges), swings, and long, long zip lines.

Had enough of swinging? Head underground to squeeze through tiny passages and glimpse majestic underground caves. This one’s not for claustrophobics!

To Rest
From Laflèche Park, head west for 20 minutes toward Wakefield to La Grange, a converted barn that offers four rustic, stylish bedrooms with access to a common kitchen, sitting room, large garden, and sun-filled yoga studio.

The sun-filled yoga studio of La Grange — Wakefield

La Grange’s converted barn — Wakefield

New this year: an organic vegetable garden that produces fresh-picked goodies for breakfast.

To Eat
Also in Wakefield, The Village House offers superb local, seasonal food. In summer, enjoy your dinner on a tiny terrace overlooking the Gatineau River. Favourites include honey-roasted beets, beef short ribs, and local Le Coprin mushrooms.

To Distract
If your muscles are sore or your nerves jangly after a day spent in the treetops and underground caves, head a short distance south (15 minutes) to Amerispa Cantley. A small, contemporary Nordic spa, the baths offer the perfect place to relax, enjoy a massage, or simply lounge in a hot tub surrounded by nature.

This photoessay first appeared in the April 2013 issue of Ottawa Magazine. Official Ottawa by Tony Fouhse is on view at the OAG Annex July 18 to Oct. 11. More details here. Words by RON CORBETT What you see is what you get. Or is it? The political machinations meet the daily mundane when photographer Tony Fouhse […]

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This photoessay first appeared in the April 2013 issue of Ottawa Magazine.
Official Ottawa by Tony Fouhse is on view at the OAG Annex July 18 to Oct. 11. More details here.

Words by RON CORBETT

What you see is what you get.Or is it? The political machinations meet the daily mundane when photographer Tony Fouhse turns his lens on the structures and subtext of our capital.

A view across the Ottawa River to Place du Portage. Photo by Tony Fouhse.

It is not so much that appearance can be deceiving. That explanation would be too simple for how award-winning photographer Tony Fouhse sees his hometown (plus, let’s remember, sometimes things are exactly as they appear). Fouhse’s perspective comes from working on the periphery, a spot from which he sees the entire arc of a story rather than the narrative points reporters tend to lead with and photographers file to their employers. From here, he can see what happens before the national news conference, before the limousine has a passenger, before the ambassador speaks.

Official Ottawa is about more than having an eye for contradictions, juxtapositions, or dichotomies. Were it merely this, there would be something disjointed in the images of Tony Fouhse, something of a Two Solitudes oeuvre rather than the sensation, time and again, of looking at one of his photos and feeling you are looking at — to borrow a phrase Hemingway used to describe an honest sentence — the true gen.

I think it helps that Ottawa is his hometown. Fouhse understands, as only a native-born can, that the prime minister’s limo has people inside who work for a living, knows that before a giant portrait of the Queen hung in the foyer of Foreign Affairs, there was something else.

He can also accept, at the end of a photo shoot with the Kazakhstan ambassador, an inexpensive pen with the portentous inscription Kazakhstan: Land of Interracial Peace and Harmony — accept it without a smirk or even without surprise that the gift is being offered by a sincere man. If you’re looking for hipster irony, you’ve come to the wrong place.

What follow are Tony Fouhse’s photos of Official Ottawa. The images are not another side of Ottawa. They are the true gen, captured by a photographer who stumbles upon such things with surprising frequency.

The Symbols

Canada Revenue Agency, Heron Road. Photo by Tony Fouhse

Konstantin V. Zhigalov, ambassador of the Republic of Kazakhstan to Canada. Photo by Tony Fouhse

This is a town that welcomes interpretation, that depends upon it. Buildings are official residences, and people are their jobs. Nothing is quite what it seems, and symbols are a way of understanding the world around us.

Is it any surprise that the Bank of Canada needs the new $20 polymer bill highlighted on the glass exterior of its headquarters?
Can the main campus of the Canada Revenue Agency be anything other than a grey Cold War-style office building?

Will the Kazakhstan Embassy retain that Soviet vibe?

In Ottawa, symbols are not flitting and ephemeral. They are bone and marrow.

The Bank of Canada building on Sparks Street becomes a billboard to announce the new $20 polymer bank note. Photo by Tony Fouhse

The Power

Power is not brash. It does not swagger. It has no need to impress or draw attention to itself.
Power exists not for form, but for function. It is the diamond-pointed tool of utility.

It is certainly not money (although the two are often confused), and to find the loci of true power,
one must go off the beaten path to places that are both unobserved and unattained — the limousine parked alone, the gated embassy, the lighted office (the solitary one) on Parliament Hill.

The prime minister’s armour-plated limousine. Photo by Tony Fouhse

The Spin

Journalists gather at the corner of Wellington and O’Connor streets across from Parliament Hill. Photo by Tony Fouhse

It is Jean Chrétien playing with golf balls and Stephen Harper posing in a parka. It is pausing a movie, keeping it on that one frame while everyone fights for the remote. It is staying on point. It is the opposite of spinning.

It is the man in the coonskin hat still wanting 11 dollar bills when you only got 10.

Restoration work on the East Block, Parliament Hill. Photo by Tony Fouhse

The Guise
In a political town, there is no such thing as deceit. Change is a constant; transmigration is the pursuit not merely of souls but of mandarins and politicians, the ADM, and the spin doctor —
how can one deceive when nothing is a constant and there is no such thing as starting point or end game?

Even the weather here is a chameleon — winter hiding as fall, summer hiding as spring — and what might, in other cities, be called a disguise is, in Ottawa, more often than not work-in-progress.

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